NEW YORK was last night making a return to normal life, with Wall Street bustling and baseball back on.

NEW YORK was last night making a return to normal life, with Wall Street bustling and baseball back on.

But all was not the same in the city where smoke still rises from the site of the destroyed World Trade Centre and thousands have been bereaved by the tragedy.

Much of the city was open again for work, including most of the financial district, just yards away from the smouldering ruins of the once-proud twin towers.

But at the site of the rescue effort, already slim hopes were fading fast as the fifth day passed since a survivor had been found.

Thousands of rescuers were continuing their work at the scene of the attacks, while FBI officers were stepping up their efforts to find evidence amid the debris that will help in their hunt for the attackers' backers.

Fears remained about the safety of three buildings surrounding ground zero - the new name for the World Trade Centre - all of them partially damaged by the collapse, while fresh dangers emerged with the discovery that one building had dangerous levels of potentially deadly gas freon.

A handful of funerals were being held for the few who have been found or the more than 100 who were declared dead on arrival at hospital, a sign of the thousands of funerals the city and greater New York can expect in the weeks to come.

Some people made homeless when their apartments near the centre were damaged by the blast as it collapsed were allowed into their homes for 10 minutes to gather vital belongings.

Vital subway services were rattling through the city as normal, moving millions of commuters who stayed at home last week. But parts of the transport system were destroyed in the attacks on the twin towers, including a subway system which linked the World Trade Centre with New Jersey.

Outside the city's fire stations, mounds of flowers, candles and thank you cards were growing as people paid tribute. Few fire stations have escaped loss, with some mourning as many as 15 firefighters entombed in the towers when they collapsed.

The close-knit fire service still has more than 300 of its members missing, while finance firm Cantor Fitzgerald remains the worst affected of all, with more than 700 staff missing, presumed dead.

A commission is to be formed later this week to look at how to rebuild the World Trade Centre.